Dinafem Sour Diesel Auto

Germination went smoothly. Beans popped on Sept 30th and, as you can see, they were quite vigorous. PPMs are taken using a Hanna Primo TDS Meter (0.5 Conversion). PH is using a Bluelab PH Pen. First time DWC, going well so far. Some slight leaf yellowing (or so it appears). I'm having a hard time telling if it's me being sensitive or if they need more nutes. Either way, new res is bubbling and ready to go for tonight (@450 ppm). Any questions or comments, feel free to drop me a line. Happy Growing!

She has been very happy this past week. Her stems are quite supple, yet sturdy due to the 6" oscillating fan. Her inter-nodal distance is the shortest (tightest) I've seen in any plant. She is a whole node ahead of the Dinafem Amnesia XXL Auto (and sprouting another!). The new solution has a noticeably lower pH (5.6 vs 6.0). It was 5.8 two days ago, but due to aerating the solution for a few days prior to res change, evaporation has dropped the PH down to 5.6. I am checking in on her every few hours, since the res change, looking for any signs of overfeeding and/or pH imbalance. I'm debating dropping the light down to 20", but I don't want to add any unnecessary stress, especially after a drastic nute change like this. She was yellowing before due to suspected under-feeding (yellowing in the cotyledons and the first single-finger leaves), so I'm hoping this adjustment won't be too-much-too-soon. I'll update over the next few days with how she responds to the new nutrients. Until next time, Happy Growing!

Today is technically day 24 since the seeds germinated, but I put her at about 3 weeks. She is finally starting to look much better now that I've started adjusting her nutes differently. I used the noted mixture (2.5ml/gal Pro-TeKt and 3.5ml/gal Foliage-Pro which gave me 615ppm), then water down to 575ppm (.5 scale, 1.15ec or 400+Tap) with just pH'ed tap water. This lady has held steady at 575ppm for over 24 hours and maintaining a perfect 5.8pH, too. Going to be topping her and starting her LST/HST within the next few days, also. 10/24 - Topped her just above 4th node. She is starting to feed more (ppms dropping by 25+), so I figure it's time to start training her. You can see where she is starting to have new, branching growth at her nodes. I've got the next nutrient change bubbling away. This next nutrient solution also contains Dyna-Zyme for root cleansing and just a light addition of some Mag-Pro. I will continue the same technique as the last res change (Higher ppm nutes + pH'ed Tap to lower to optimal range). Thanks for stopping in and, as always, Happy Growing!

10/27 - Today is technically day 28 since germination. I would normally wait three more days before doing this update, but enough has changed, I figured it warranted documenting it early. Today I did a solution change to half-strength week 3 guidelines per the Dyna-Gro feed schedule from their website. This gave me a ppm of 740 total, including 170 ppm tap (measured using Hanna Primo .5 conversion). This gives me 570ppm (1.14ec) of nutrients. The solution was changed about four hours prior to their nap time (of four hours in length). Shortly after the lights came back on I noticed this discoloration on her roots (as shown above in picture and video). Both ladies in the video were given the exact same solution at the same time and now show noticeably different ppms (Sour Diesel Auto - 770ppm; Amnesia XXL Auto - 720ppm). I'm not sure why they are exhibiting different reactions to the same solution. She doesn't seem to be showing any other negative effects at this point. Root growth is phenomenal and her vegetation has only accelerated since being topped. Just slightly concerned about what to do with the root issue. I have thought about adding Botanicare Hydroguard since the smaller buckets will run slightly warmer in temp. Once they start drinking more, I will bump them up to 5 gallon buckets, but that's not needed at this time. Any advice, questions, or observations are very welcome. This is my first DWC run and first run with Dyna-Gro. Edit: 10/29 - Added 2ml/gal Botanicare Hydroguard as a precaution regarding her potential root issue. Res temps are mid-seventies, so I'd say it's a safe move and some relatively cheap insurance. Edit: 10/31 - PPMs kept increasing up close to 800 from the original 740. Added pH'd water to dilute right close to 700ppm. Would have diluted more, but that was touching the bottom of the net pot. Removed two main fan leaves that were actively shading new growth nodes. Added second Mars Hydro SP150 and raised both to 18" above canopy.

11/3 - Today is technically the first day of Week 5 and also the first day I could see a visible drop in her water level since her last check-in (~12 hours apart). As a result, her ppms shot up to around 800. I diluted the solution with straight tap (7.5pH, 170ppm) since her pH was registering around 5.3. This brought her up to 5.6pH and 670ppm (1.0ec + tap, 500ppm of nutrients). I would have liked to adjust her pH more, but the water level ended up at the bottom of the basket. I'll adjust further as necessary. The other day while attempting to LST her top branches, they ended up snapping off, so I just topped her down one node and broadened her other LST to make her as squat as possible. Once I am able to find a suitable individual ScrOG screen, I will put it on her. 11/4 - I wasn't even planning on doing an update today, but I want to note a few changes. The first of which is a visible difference between her foliage density in a span of 36 hours. Her root bundle is over a foot long and getting more wound up every day. I removed her LST ties in order to take advantage of the ScrOG screen apparatus (see notes below). After lights came back on, she measured 645ppm and had another notable drop in water level. Currently, I am preparing another nutrient solution that closely matches what she is feeding on now. I will be upgrading her to a 5 gallon bucket. I will be aiming for 1ec of nutrients/additives (500ppm + Tap on my meter, Hanna Primo .5 conversion). Tap measured 180ppm, so target ppm would be 680. Later that same day... So I finished upgrading her to a 5 gallon bucket before I actually got done writing the update. Added one photo showing new 5 gallon setup. Solo ScrOG test mk1 - In an attempt to do a ScrOG, but maintain control over each bucket, while still having relatively easy access to each reservoir, I decided to throw together this little contraption. I removed the lowest complete segment of a tomato cage, leaving a short "tail" beyond the lower ring to act as a peg to insert into corresponding holes in the lid. The lower ring is 10" in diameter and the upper is approximately 12" in diameter. Each ring is 11" apart. I would prefer to have a shorter segment, but I haven't worked out exactly how to do this yet. I would prefer to set the screen height at around 6" above the bucket instead of 11". This will have to suffice for the time being while I let my latent conscious work out a solution or one is provided by the community. Above each cage will sit a coated wire fence with grids measuring ~2"x3", as shown in the above picture. 11/5 - Uploaded short video showing Solo ScrOG Apparatus in place. Screen height currently set to 6". Thanks for stopping by my garden, and, as always, Happy Growing!

11/10 - Last night I did some late-night defoliation and removed about 30 good sized fan leaves and made some minor adjustments to her ScrOG positioning. She drank steadily through the week and once she drank down about 1 gal (4 days), I checked tds/pH. She measured in at 520ppm and 6.8pH. This was outside of my desired range in both values, so I decided to top-off with some legit full-strength nutes to balance the scales. After adding the solution, she measured 650ppm and 6.2pH. Not ideal, but acceptable for the moment. I feel like every day I check on her, her roots have gotten even bigger.

Sorry for the late update, everyone. Thank you for checking out the garden. This lady has absolutely exploded! I am anxious to see how her buds stack up over the coming weeks. She has been drinking and feeding so much lately that I went ahead and bumped her up to 75% nutes instead of just 50%. We will see soon how she handles them. I was getting crazy pH swings (down to 4.4) because of how heavy she had been feeding. With the tap water I have, the new nutes measure about 850-900 ppm, but tap is about 200, so ~700 ppm of actual nutes. Feel free to hit me up with any comments or questions. 11/21 - Uploaded video showing canopy density and frequency of bud-sites. This lady was only topped once. 11/22 - Uploaded new shots of canopy (48 hours after bumping ppms) Thanks for stopping by the garden, and , as always, Happy Growing!

11/23 - Update one day early. I will do detailed measurements tomorrow and update as usual. Slight stretch this week and buds starting to show pistils. High number of bud-sites and tight stacking. Still doing periodic removal of a few leaves here and there from her undercarriage. 11/24 - Added video. 11/25 - Topped off Res (6am) - Almost 1/2 gal 11/26 - Added more pictures Thanks for stopping by the garden, and, as always, Happy Growing!

12/1 - Moving right along! Today is December 1st, Day 1 of week 9, or D63. Buds are finally starting to swell. Looking forward to seeing how they ripen over the next few weeks. Not sure how long she will last, but she still has a ways to go. This is always the hardest, but most exciting part! There are dozens of buds that are already super sticky, and if my last grow is any indication, it's only going to get better. Not sure what yield will be as this is a shared space, but I'm hoping to hit 100g from this plant. That would give me roughly 1.5gpw when counting via square footage/canopy space (270w/4plants = 67.5w/plant. 100g/67.5w = 1.48gpw). 12/5 - Uploaded video from 12/4 Thanks for stopping by the garden, and, as always, Happy Growing!

12/8 - Here we are at the beginning of week 10. Her buds are starting to frost up and she is definitely bulking up more than her sister, but her sister has a longer projected flowering time-frame (Heavy Sativa vs Indica). Anyways, did some minor pruning for airflow optimization and to remove some unhappy leaves from her undergrowth. They weren't yellow, but they weren't getting enough light and it was showing. Haven't done much to her this week other than top her off with Tap every other day. Seems like her feed from last week was on point as her pH and EC were solid as the water level lowered. After her first top-off, her EC started to fall as she ate more (reflected in the lower ec in the res after topping off with tap). Tapered her down to 80% strength as she is moving further along in flower and should hopefully finish sooner than her sister. If she needs a bump in her EC, I may top off with full strength nutes, but I'm going to just wait and see how she responds. Breeder's timeline reflects a ~65 day seed-to-harvest, but I can assure anyone out there growing this strain in DWC that she will not be ready in that time-frame. Currently she is sitting on day 67 and still looks like she has another 2 weeks or more. I grew her in soil before and she was ready pretty darn close to her expected time-frame (~70 days), but this strain responds to DWC differently. She didn't have slow growth or anything; just seems like she will veg longer in hydro than in soil. Not sure why. Thanks for stopping by the garden, and, as always, Happy Growing!

12/16 - Today is Day 77 from seed. Mid-last week I switched her over to 60% strength (~1.2ec) and today I switched her over to flush with 10ml/gal GH FloraKleen. Upon checking multiple buds for trich ripeness and I found an average of approximately 10% amber across the whole canopy. Some of the larger, more mature buds were closer to 15-20% Amber while some varied as low as 3-5% Amber. I am choosing to go ahead and flush her out since I need the space in the tent sooner, rather than later. I am planning on a 48-72 hour flush then chop. This will definitely be my biggest yield to date, but her sister, the Amnesia XXL Auto might top her out yet, though she is still a couple weeks out. Thanks for checking out the garden. Stay tuned for updates this week as we approach chop day. As always, Happy Growing!

Chopped late on 12/18. Grand total of 466g wet weight. If I lose 80% in drying and lumber, that will still leave me with 94g dry bud, but only time will tell. Will update with more pics when they go into jars (5-7 days from chop). Though, I may decide to leave some of the bigger buds to dry longer to prevent any moisture issues.